Review Summary

This infinitely silly, unconscionably entertaining action film earns most of its juice from the martial-arts star Jet Li, the eminent martial-arts choreographer Yuen Wo Ping and the fine British actor Bob Hoskins in full terrifying lather. But special mention too must be made of the film's excellent sound-effects team, which with a symphony of postsynchronous bone crunching and body thwacking has helped push the fight sequences to rare seat-jolting heights. "Unleashed" has been peddled as the action movie in which Mr. Li flexes his acting chops, which is, to put it nicely, a load of hooey. His talent is for action. Although it lacks the ambitious reach of Zhang Yimou's period epic "Hero," one of Mr. Li's higher-profile pictures, "Unleashed" has a satisfying purity of form. Or, to put it somewhat differently, the story is stupid enough for you to concentrate on all the bodies in fast, furious motion. — Manohla Dargis